The sea-men bring spices

and sugar so fine,

Which serve the brave gallants to drink with their wine, With lemmons and oranges

all of the best,

To relish their pallats

when they make a feast; Sweet figs, prunes, and raysins, by them brought home be. There's none, &c.

To comfort poor people
the seamen do strive,
And brings in maintenance
to keep them alive,

As raw silk and cotton wool
to card and to spin,
And so by their labours
their livings comes in;
Most men are beholding
to sea-men we see,
With none but a sea-man
I married will be.

The mercer's beholding

we know well enough, For holland, lawn, cambrick,

and other gay stuff,

That's brought from beyond-seas

by sea-men so bold,

The rarest that ever

men's eyes did behold, God prosper the sea-men where ever they be, There's none, &c.

The merchants themselves

are beholding also To honest sea-men

that on purpose do go To bring them home profit from other strange lands, Or else their fine daughters

must work with their hands, The nobles and gentry

in every degree,

Are also beholding, &c.

Thus for rich or poor men

the seamen does good,

And sometimes comes off with

loss of much blood;

If they were not a guard

and a defence for our land;

Our enemies soon will get

the upper hand,

And then in a woful case

straight should we be,

There's none but a seaman

shall marry with me.

To draw to conclusion,

and so make an end,
I hope that great Neptune
my love will befriend,
And send him home safely

with health and with life,

Then shall I with joyfulness
soon be his wife;

You maids, wifes, and widdowes

that sea-men's loves be,

With hearts and with voices
joyn prayers with me.

God blesse all brave seamen

from quicksands and rocks, From losse of their blood,

and from enemies knocks, From lightning and thunder and tempests so strong, From shipwrack and drownin,

and all other wrong;

And they that to these words

will not say Amen,

"Tis pitty that they should ever

speak word agen.

L.P.

Printed for F. Coses, T. Vere, J. Wright, and J. Clark.

A FAMOUS SEA-FIGHT BETWEEN CAPTAIN WARD AND THE RAINBOW.

To the Tune of Captain Ward, &c.

[From the British Museum Collection of Old Ballads.]

STRIKE up, you lusty gallants,

with musick and sound of drum,

For we have descryed a rover

upon the sea is come,

His name is Captain Ward,
right well it doth appear,
There has not been such a rover
found out this thousand year.

For he hath sent unto the King,
the sixth of January,

Desiring that he might come in
with all his company:

And if your King will let me come,
my tale have told,

till I

I will bestow for my ransome
full thirty tun of gold.

O nay, O nay, then said our King,

nay, this may not be, To yield to such a rover,

myself will not agree;

He hath deceiv'd the Frenchman,
likewise the King of Spain;

And how can he be true to me,

that hath been false to twain ?

With that our King provided

a ship of worthy fame, Rainbow is she called,

if you would know her name; Now the gallant Rainbow

she roves upon the sea, Five hundred gallant seamen

to bear her company.

The Dutchman and the Spaniard,
she made them for to flye,
Also the bonny Frenchman,
as she met him on the sea.
When as this gallant Rainbow
did come where Ward did lye,
Where is the captain of this ship?
this gallant Rainbow did cry.

O that am I, says Captain Ward, there's no man bids me lye; And if thou art the King's fair ship,

thou art welcome unto me.

I'll tell thee what, says Rainbow,

our King is in great grief,

That thou shouldst lye upon the sea,

and play the arrant thief,

And will not let our merchant's ships

pass as they did before;

Such tidings to our King is come,

which grieves his heart full sore.